I hadn't either but it says it's him and McElwain for the spot in this article. Morton has worked for Harbaugh in San Fran and at San Diego. He took USC's offense from #44 to #14 in S&P+ in 2 years as OC despite the 2nd year being the first of their sanctions. I think anyone would argue he exceeded expectations with the Jets this year as well.

I think it is a little more than that now - we seem to be building a staff of analysts and position coaches on the offensive side of the ball that might necessitate the founding of "Michigan Offense, LLC" by the athletic department. What they could do is make the coordinators and Jim the board of "Michigan Football", then spin off the offense as a subsidiary and maintain controlling interest so it is semi-independent but still answerable to Harbaugh.

His success as an offensive mind is not in ddispute. More importantly, because of his familiarity of the SEC on how they recruit, identify talent, develop talent and scheme teams it would be a huge advantage for MIchigan to have him on their staff. The reality is the SEC plays the best football and Michigan/JH can learn a lot from him.

No, Nuss was fired at Bama. Well, pushed out. We "hired him away" before he could be canned.

McElwain doesn't fit the "anybody can be great at Bama" quip because he built the Bama offense. In Saban's first season they were 54th in S&P Offense. Then Saban replaced Major Applewhite with McElwain and he had them up to 7th the next year. 3rd, 1st, and 4th after that. Won Saban's first two national titles with McElwain's offense. McElwain came in before they were a juggernaut, he helped Saban make them what they are today. He was the first OC they won with.

Then at Colorado State he turned one of the nation's worst offenses into one of the best. He knows his shit.

I think his biggest mistake at Florida was the handling of the Will Grier matter. I have no idea how it went down in reality, but my impression was that Grier was pissed enough to leave and sit out a year. Had Grier remained at Florida, McElwain may still be there today.

I always thought he was in over his head at a school like Florida, but the man does know his football and would add value to the Michigan staff.

While I agree with the broader sentiment that McElwain would be better than status quo or Enos, this would be a long distance from the offensive version of the Don Brown hire. Bama was putting up huge numbers against Georgia State and Kentucky, but he probably averaged 15-24 points against the meat of the SEC. Same can be said for his success at CSU...big points against Fresno but they didn’t break 20 too often against traditional top-25 teams (sure talent is a factor in that but I’m looking for signs of being exceptional).

I’m all for this pursuit - I don’t think the “Don Brown” hire exists and McElwain should be an improvement - but I’d wait to see performance in the B1G schedule before I start yelling from the mountains.

Managing my own expectations has probably been the biggest issue I’ve had with UM football since 2011, so I’m working on improving myself each day.

Is this an example of a coach with a good resume coming to us in a bad situation?

How does the chemistry between pep, him, and Harbaugh work?

I suppose in the end the lack of clarity and the confusing organization, on top of a bad end to our recruiting and our offensive nightmare of last year, has me nervous going into a brutal schedule next year.

I know there won’t be, and maybe shouldn’t be, but I would feel great if Harbaugh came out and said these are the responsibilities of each coach.

Enough of the shark talk. Harbaugh is diagnosing a known issue with our offense, and McElwain is in a great position to provide informed outside perspective into what those problems are, and how they might be solved. Harbaugh would be higher than giraffe pussy if he didn't hire McElwain as a coordinator.